6.0 earthquake rattles Tokyo

Tokyo

A magnitude-6.0 earthquake shook the Tokyo area Saturday, injuring at least 27 people, rattling buildings across the sprawling capital and temporarily suspending flights and train services.

The earthquake struck at 4:35 p.m. (12:35 a.m. PDT) and was centered about 55 miles underground in Chiba prefecture, just east of Tokyo, Japan’s Meteorological Agency said. There was no danger of tsunami, the agency said.

The quake was the strongest to hit the capital since 1992 as measured on Japan’s sliding scale of tremor intensity, the Kyodo News agency reported.

The quake injured at least 27 people, including five people hit by a falling signboard at a supermarket in neighboring Saitama prefecture, Kyodo said. There were some 50 cases of people briefly trapped in elevators.

Franklin stronger as it moves east in Atlantic

Miami

Tropical Storm Franklin strengthened Saturday as it moved away from the Bahamas and headed eastward in the Atlantic, while its rotation carried extremely hot weather to the Florida peninsula.

Heat index readings along Florida’s Atlantic coast could exceed 110 degrees during the weekend, even though Franklin’s 70 mph wind and strong rain were not forecast to affect land. It was expected to continue strengthening into today and would be classified as a hurricane if wind speed increases to at least 74 mph.

At midday Saturday, the storm’s center was about 245 miles north-northeast of Great Abaco Island and nearly 635 miles west-southwest of Bermuda, moving northeast at 9 mph.

The system was no major threat to any land mass, and the National Hurricane Center in Miami said Franklin may lose its tropical characteristics by early next week.

“It is quite possible that little or nothing will be left of Franklin … in two to three days,” hurricane specialist James Franklin said Saturday.

Sahara dust cloud headed for U.S. South

Miami

An enormous, hazy cloud of dust from the Sahara Desert is blowing toward the southern United States, but meteorologists do not expect much effect beyond colorful sunsets.

The leading edge of the cloud – nearly the size of the continental United States – should move across Florida sometime from Monday through Wednesday.

“This is not going to be a tremendous event, but it will be kind of interesting,” said Jim Lushine, a severe weather expert with the National Weather Service in Miami.

He said the dust could make sunrises and sunsets spectacular.

It might not have much effect on the rest of the country, said Scott Kelly, a meteorologist with the weather service in Melbourne.

“Maybe south Texas or Mexico if that dust cloud keeps moving westward, but nothing north of Florida, unless a weather system can dive southward and pull that air northward,” he said.

Such dust clouds are not uncommon, especially at this time of year. They start when weather patterns called tropical waves pick up dust from the desert in North Africa, carry it a couple of miles into the atmosphere and drift westward.

Cuban dissidents vow more acts of defiance

Havana, Cuba

Several Cuban dissidents picked up by authorities during the second attempt this month to launch rare public protests in Havana were released without charges Saturday.

But leaders vowed to continue their bold acts of defiance even as the fate of about a dozen detained dissidents remained unknown, clashes with government supporters continued and police presence on the street increased.

“We are going to continue to insist and we are calling for demonstrations across the island,” Martha Beatriz Roque, Cuba’s most prominent female opposition leader, told reporters in Havana after being released from custody Saturday.